


Circuitry

by malyce



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Alternate Universe, Character Death, F/M, Violence, drusilla is really terrifying, initiative - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-14
Updated: 2013-06-14
Packaged: 2017-12-15 00:10:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,213
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/843041
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/malyce/pseuds/malyce
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Alternate Universe.  What if the Initiative had captured Drusilla instead of Spike?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Circuitry

Three locks on the door of her cell. One jolt of electricity running through her brain, trying to rearrange the molecules without her permission.  
  
At the moment, she was conspicuously aware of a spark that threatened to combust inside her own unnaturally animate body. She drew pictures and wrote words on the walls with her fingernails. Words would not be understood by anyone who sought to interpret them, only by those who let her expressions fall over them like a blanket.  
  
 _Stars sky birds free poison soul father son's glass lights too bright so bright so bright too bright_... all of these words were etched into the walls, and on and on they went with no real pattern except for the phrase "too bright." One's first impression would be that the poor creature simply wanted the lights in her cell dimmed. It would make sense; vampires were nocturnal creatures, and would want the darkness. The fluorescent lights hummed throughout the night, and gave even the human workers headaches with their oppressive brightness and constant noise.  
  
  
On closer inspection, one would see that she only used the words "bright" and  
"light" after "father" or "son." The initiative gave up on interpreting the words, and decided on a simpler course of action.  
  
Riley Finn was given the unenviable task of cutting Drusilla's fingernails. He had been warned not to look into her eyes, no matter what she said.  
  
"Why?" he had asked, "the chip is functioning, isn't it?" Forrest and Maggie Walsh had given him identical concerned expressions to let him know that it was not his physical well being that concerned them.  
  
When he cut her nails, she howled as though Riley were stabbing her. She was chained to a metal chair that was bolted to the ground, and wrenching violently against her restraints. He tried to hold her fingers in one hand, and succeeded only in slicing part of her fingertip. He cringed as he realized what he was doing: holding the hand and cutting the nails of a corpse.  
  
"Hostile 17," he begged, "This will only take a second if you would just hold still and-" He stopped talking as he felt something poking the side of his neck. He distinctly heard Drusilla giggle as she stroked his larynx with her nails.  
  
"You can't hurt me," he taunted her, saying it more to reassure himself than to dissuade the creature whose talons were currently threatening to puncture his throat.  
  
"There’s such sweetness here,” she murmured absently, “It's a shame you spoiled it with those things they put into your blood. They think that'll make you strong- strong enough to play soldier with all the other little boys, but no- I could have made you something more." Riley let his gaze drift above Drusilla’s throat to her chin, at her lips. She ran her tongue along her teeth and smiled at him. Riley swallowed, and felt her nails pressing deeper into his throat.  
  
"I don't know what you're talking about," he said to the ground, "No one ever does." He had expected her to look hurt or perhaps to end his life right there, but instead she ran her fingernail down his jaw line as he shook. As is she read his mind, she whispered,  
  
"I feel the electricity in here," she put a finger to her lips, "Shih! You know why I don't take what's mine, don't you? I saw a butterfly once, and I crushed it with my heel. I don't think I've ever seen anything quite so beautiful." Riley shivered visibly, "All these poor things," she half sang, "stuck in their cages like rabbits for a stew. You think they'll line up to be analyzed and studied. My sweet boy, that would be like trying to put the night in a jar and keep it for your own."  
  
"The chip..." Drusilla hummed a song that Riley could swear he had heard somewhere before, and he cringed. What had the initiative been thinking? No metal chip forged of circuits and wires could have restrained the vampiress. Her psychic visions, the dark magic that was more in her existence than her practice, and ability to see things that both did and did not exist made her impossible to hold. If there was a jolt of electricity, she would simply ignore it; send the patterns of her brain in circular motion, ignore the pain that came from killing a human.  
  
"Why don't you look into my eyes? Afraid of what you'll find?" she asked. Riley held the nail clippers tightly in his fist and forcibly kept his eyes down. He would not look above her lips, even as he felt himself drawn to meet her gaze.  
  
The keys were in his hand. When he had looked into her eyes, he had heard the words, and he had obeyed her unspoken commands. For a few seconds, there had been a whirl of colors and shapes that flew past him. When he came to the end of the line of cages, he could hear a scream that seemed to come from some place far in the distance. Cells swung open, and bizarre parodies of humanity stepped into the hallway. Riley was only lucid for a few seconds before he felt a set of needles plunging into the side of his neck.  
  
*****  
  
He was lying on the ground outside of the building, and Riley felt himself growing dizzy. Black spots dotted his vision; he could just make out a full moon hovering in the darkened sky. A shadow eclipsed the white orb, and Drusilla's silhouette came into view.  
  
"It's beautiful, isn't it?" she asked. Riley saw the trickle of blood that had dried at her fingertips, and licked his lips, she smiled at him, and he caught himself looking into her eyes again, perhaps hoping only to get lost in that  
dark abyss that was her mind for a few more seconds, "Here's where you make your choice, sweet one," she whispered, "either the moon or the dirt... down there in the dirt with the worms." She raised her wrist to her lips, and pierced a vain so carefully that Riley thought of dainty Victorian ladies sipping tea. She didn't spill a drop of the dark black substance on her dress, but offered it to him.  
  
Riley responded to her offer by ripping the delicate flesh of her wrist with his own blunt incisors and gorging himself on the unnatural blood that spilled from her veins. He could taste Dr. Walsh in his mouth. Drusilla had only recently devoured Riley's mentor, and the blood was fresh and warm.  
  
When he felt every vein and artery coming back to life, he stared back up at the stars. They were- dare he think it? Singing. Resonating with energy he had never felt before and the moon was hanging above them.  
  
  
"Too bright," Riley moaned. Drusilla pulled him to his feet.  
  
"It's always bright when you first look at it," she chirped happily, "Now come on; the night doesn't last forever, and I want you to be born soon... born into  
what you really are." With the taste of blood still on his lips, Riley followed Drusilla into the dark forest, anxious to get away from the oppressive light.


End file.
